[arin-ppml] ARIN releases new version of the Legacy Registration

[Cliff Bedore]

I haven't seen this discussed in a while and I still see the "no fall 
back to status quo" as a problem.  I think if ARIN would change the 
"terminate for convenience" by the legacy holder so that the address 
space would revert back whatever the status is at that time for those 
who didn't sign the LRSA.

My thinking is as follows.  ARIN is trying to get Legacy address holders 
to sign an LRSA.  Many have indicated a willingness to do so under 
certain conditions.  It appears that one of the major stumbling blocks 
for many Legacy holders is being able to "drop out" at a later time for 
unspecified reasons.

Let's look at what happens if that were allowed.  Far more legacies 
appear to be willing to sign and ARIN would have accomplished what it 
wanted to do.  Assume at some time in the future, some of the legacy 
holders wanted to terminate "for convenience". If at that time, they are 
allowed to drop back to whatever services ARIN provides to non-signing 
legacy holders, it would be as if they never signed. If ARIN has at that 
time stopped providing any services to non-signers, they are in deep 
doo-doo and they will probably not terminate for convenience.  If ARIN 
is providing at that time what they provide now in terms of services, 
ARIN will have had at least some time of membership and updated 
records.  Better than having never signed.

If fewer legacy holders sign up because of the more restrictive clauses, 
ARIN will have lost funds and better contact information and they will 
be in a worse position than the scernario above.
 
If in the first scenario, ARIN does a good job of stewardship, I can't 
believe any who signed the LRSA would want to drop out and ARIN is in a 
better position to recover truly abandoned IPv4.
 
I think most legacy people feel they should not end up worse off than 
the non-signers if they do sign and I think that one clause makes them 
feel that way.  If you want, think of it as a "no fault divorce" where 
each party leaves with what they came in with.
 
Cliff